Defective Products

There are a variety of theories upon which one might sue for products liability. Among these theories are intent, negligence, strict liability, and breach of warranty. One commonality among every theory is that there must be proof that the product sold was defective and that it was defective when it left the defendant's control.  And because this element applies to all theories of products liability, it's important to understand well the rules regarding defective products.

There are three types of defects: manufacturing defects, design defects, and inadequate warnings.

Manufacturing Defects:  These defects occur when a product emerges from manufacturing different from and more dangerous than the products that were made properly. Importantly, you should note that with manufacturing defects, it's not required that all products within a line of products suffer from the defect; instead, only certain products within the line of products suffer from the defect, and those products are more dangerous that the products that are not defective.

Design Defects:  These defects occur when all products within a line of products have dangerous propensities that render them all defective based on a design defect in the product itself.

Inadequate Warnings: Along with design defects and manufacturing defects, a product might be defective as a result of the manufacturer's failure to provide adequate warnings as to the risk involved in using the product. Be careful with this one; if the risk is apparent to reasonable users then the manufacturer is not likely to face liability for failing to warn about such apparent dangers.

Along with understanding the various defects, you should also understand how each defect is proven. For manufacturing defects, defendant will be liable if plaintiff can show that the product failed to perform as safely as an ordinary consumer would expect. For a design defect, plaintiff must show that defendant could have made the product safer and that doing so would not have been economically or otherwise infeasible.  And for inadequate warnings it'll need to be shown that there was a lack of warning as to a non-apparent danger; for example, manufacturers are not likely to be held liable for not warning buyers about the dangers of a knife since the dangers are apparent and for the knives to perform their function requires a danger inherent to the product.